In recent years, an increasing number of electronic ballasts are being used in the lighting industry relating to HID lamps. State of the art electronic ballasts utilize a circuit comprising a passive input filter, a Power Factor Correction (PFC) stage, an inverter and an ignitor. The state of the art ballasts are designed to maintain a relatively high Open Circuit Voltage (OCV) and high DC voltage source for the inverter. Consequently, unnecessary losses are developed in the circuit, specifically, but not exclusively, during the lamp's initial transient phase that follows the ignition of the arc while the lamp's voltage is low and its current is high.